Friday, November 18, 2016

A graduating benediction

I was asked to offer a final benediction as the KCML November block course finished in Friday. It was a final gathering for our Year 2 graduating interns. It was a return to placements for our Year 1 interns. It was the end of a complex blockcourse, one that was ever changing and with multiple external demands for the staff team.

Monday, August 15, 2016

Fiction as missiology: an indigenous Christology in Papua New Guinea

I deliver a second paper at the International Association Mission Studies, Korea on Monday. This paper is titled Fiction as missiology: a Creative “hapkas” Christology in Drusilla Modjeska’s “The Mountain.” As with my first paper, Missiological approaches to “Silence”, this takes a hobby, a holiday read of The Mountain by Drusilla Modjeska and integrates it with my research interests in missiology. Again, it is an interdisciplinary exercise; reading fiction, post-colonial literature and Old Testament exegesis in order to engage indigenous people in Jesus bloodline. It is personal, a return to my story, doing theology in relation to my country of birth – Papua New Guinea.

It is a complicated paper, but one I’m really, really pleased with. I consider it some of my most creative yet Biblically deep reflection I’ve done, helped greatly by conversation with fellow PNG kid, Mark Brett. Whether the audience agree we will soon see.

Here’s my conclusion:

In sum, I have examined fiction from outside the West and argued for a distinct and creative Christology as one result of religious change in PNG. “Hapkas” provides a way to understand ancestor gift, fully human, fully divine and the new Adam. It is a reading that attributes primary agency to an indigenous culture and offers a transformational way to understand religious change as communal participation in the art markets of twenty-first century global capitalism. It is consistent with recent Biblical scholarship regarding the Genesis narratives in the Old Testament. This suggests that to understand conversion missiologically, requires following Jesus who is “‘good’ man true” for the particularity of all indigenous cultures.

Sunday, May 29, 2016

reading color purple and the ministry of Lydia

On the Sabbath we went outside the city gate to the river, where we expected to find a place of prayer. We sat down and began to speak to the women who had gathered there. 14 One of those listening was a woman from the city of Thyatira named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth. Acts 16:13-14.

Lydia, dealer in purple. In the The Brilliant History of Color in Art, purple in the Roman empire is a “fashion phenomenon … Rome adored this color with a passion we cannot imagine today” (The Brilliant History of Color in Art, 28). Purple was made from shellfish. They needed to be soaked in liquid, ground together, thus releasing the enzymes that resulted in the colour purple.

Lydia lived in Philippi, a city situated near head of Aegean Sea. In other words, in a city able to produce its own colour purple, using shellfish from the eastern Mediterranean Sea. However, rotting shellfish stink. It is near impossible to leave with the smells made by rotting shellfish, which led to them being placed on the outskirts of towns and cities. This is evident in Tyre, where if you visit today, you can see, outside the town, downwind, the vats in which the color purple was manufactured (The Brilliant History of Color in Art, 29).

This provides another way to read Acts 16. The traditional reading is that Lydia was a God-fearer and hung out with the Jews, who had no synagogue, and thus met by the river on the outskirts of the city.

What if in fact Lydia, the dealer in purple, was tending her vats full of rotting shellfish, located, for reasons of smell, outside the city? What if the beginning of Paul’s cross-cultural ministry in Greece began amid the stench of rotten shellfish?

Christologically, this would provide an interesting way to frame the mission of Paul. Purple was a restricted colour in the Roman Empire. In 48 BC, it was ruled that only Ceasar’s could wear togas died in purple. If Paul begins his ministry amongst the colour purple, is he making a statement about royalty? Not from the Emperor’s position of power, but from outside the city, amid the stench of primary production. It is consistent with the Christ he serves, who died outside the city, the enzymes of his body released in suffering. Lydia becomes, like the women carrying their spices after the Resurrection, a worker amid the stench of rot and decay.

Christologically, of these women, Mary Magdalene is the first to give voice to the life of the Resurrection Christ. She is thus known as the first apostle. Lydia, like Mary, is the first woman named when Paul carries the gospel into Greece. Is a textual echo being created? Are two women, Mary and Lydia, bound physically by their service amid the smell of death? Are they also bound spiritually by their willingness to be the first to say yes, one in Jerusalem, another in Greece, to new life in the Resurrected Christ?

Such are the possibilities created by reading the color purple in light of the ministry of Lydia in Acts 16.

Wednesday, May 18, 2016

is there another sermon in the room

I arrived at church on Sunday to preach. It had been a message I’d worked on faithfully part of Wednesday morning, and again Friday and Saturday evenings. I had a full script and powerpoint.

Within minutes of walking into the auditorium, I began to wonder if there was another sermon in the room. It is only the 2nd time in 22 years of ministry that this has happened. Deep breathe. What to do?

The trigger – On arrival, I commented to the worship leader on the visual display, including the bright red tablecloth spread for Pentecost. “Oh,” she said, “it comes from PNG.” Now, I was raised in PNG. I often share a story from PNG when talking about mission and link it to the Pentecost story in Acts 2. Was the tablecloth an invitation to offer another sermon, a story and some insights about Pentecost and mission?

The points for doing an impromptu sermon.
1. It was Pentecost Sunday. Such days are always a more pointed reminder of the need to trust the Spirit. Was the tablecloth an invitation to me to trust the Spirit in fresh ways?
2. A helpful part of my call to be Principal at Knox Centre for Ministry and Leadership was a comment made in the interview process – “Could you return to your story?” (for more on the impact of this on my research at the moment, see here). It was a question – posed by someone with the ability to connect two quite different parts of my presentations – in ways that offered me new eyes. My story felt held. My experience felt important. It was a moment, of care, of hope, and potentially of guidance. Seeing that table cloth from PNG, I heard again the question – “Could you return to your story?”
3. There was a sense of energy and immediacy. It would allow a very contextual engagement with that service, that Sunday.
4. The group gathering for worship was smaller in number and older in age than I had expected. A more conversational sermon was, I felt, more likely to work in that setting.

The points against doing an impromptu sermon
1. I had no idea of length. How long could a few jotted notes last? Related, as a visiting speaker, I did not want to appear lightweight or under prepared or waffly. Would it link logically? Could it be landed?
2. I had put a good amount of work into the existing sermon.
3. Going impromptu would generate a significant amount of adrenaline, which after a demanding week, needed to be considered.
4. I’ve seen a few preachers “throw away their notes” and I’ve always wondered whether it was real, or just attention seeking. So if I went impromptu, how would I want to frame it?

Four reasons for. Four reasons against. A draw.

What to do? I gave myself the worship time to further test the discernment. I had a sermon already as a backup. As the congregation sang, at the front, I was frantically making notes. I mapped out a possible opening that noted the two possible sermons and linked to the table cloth. I identified three headings that would give some structure. Each was related to the Lectionary text (Acts 2). I find myself able to make some contemporary connection for each of the points. I realised I had a conclusion, that returned to the tablecloths. The Evernote function on my cell phone was great. I cut and pasted, moving phrases around, adding more insights as the sung worship continued. A couple of comments made during the worship were further encouragement. They could be woven in, adding connectivity to the message.

As I stood to preach, it was decision time.

I decided to go with the impromptu. It was, after all Pentecost. There were a few stutter steps. There were a few moments when the logic was not as strong as I would like. But it was connective. There was energy in the room. A number of folk afterward expressed how important the message was for them. After I spoke, the worship leader shared some more about the story, sharing of reconciliation and justice, a story that would never have been told if I had not gone impromptu.

Would I do it again? Yes.

Would it matter if I had done the original? No. That also would have blessed, I am sure. (Just a different set of folk).

Oh, it lasted 18 minutes. And what I shared might actually be useful for a writing project that I need to finish …

Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Could you return to your story? “hapkas” theology as personal experience

“Could you return to your story?”

It was a question asked as I finished a research presentation. I was interviewing to be Principal at KCML. The interview process began with me taking a 50 minute “mock” lecture to a group of “mock” students. It had gone well, apart from the jug of water for the lecturer, that developed a crack half way through, resulting in water gently easing under my laptop as I spoke. “As long as it is consistent for all those being interviewed” I quipped. The interview process then moved, after lunch with the interview panel, to a research presentation. Fifty minutes on some aspect of my current work, followed by 50 minutes of question and answer.

It was then that the question was posed. “Could you return to your story?” Puzzled, I asked for elaboration. “Well, you began your lecture this morning with your story, of growing up in PNG. So I’m asking what might happen if you returned in your research to your story?”

I remember being struck by the depth of listening. After nearly 3 hours of talking, here was someone with the ability to connect two quite different parts of my presentations, in ways that offered me new eyes. My story felt held. My experience felt important. Perhaps in this place, I would see myself, including my old self, in new ways. It was a moment, of care, of hope, and potentially of guidance in my research journey.

Fast forward some 13 months later. The interview in January 2015 resulted in my beginning as Principal in October 2015. I brought with me a significant piece of research, a book project on innovation and collaboration. Begun in July, it has absorbed all of my writing time in the period since.

Last week, the manuscript was sent to the editor. It will return, but in the meantime, I have some space to begin again. “What will you write?” asked my family on Sunday evening. (I have a habit of spending the first 45 minutes of every work day writing.) I sifted through a few possibilities. The next most important thing is two papers I have to present in Korea at the International Association of Mission Studies. The deadline for submission is 31 March. I chose one (the second is on how to understand Silence in mission), and got to writing.

I looked at my desk yesterday. I am writing on Christology in Papua New Guinea. My research involves reading art gallery publications about bark cloth. I laughed. “Could you return to your story?” was the question 13 months ago.

Well, my first new writing project in this role and I have. I have found myself, by a random set of circumstances, writing on my country of birth. I am listening to ABC recordings of PNG women singing. I am exploring theology expressed in visual, rather than written ways. I am bringing my years of study of Christology and post-colonial theology and literature to bear on my own story. I am reading Mark Brett’s Decolonizing God: The Bible in the Tides of Empire (Bible in the Modern World). He also is born in PNG. I am beginning to imagine an academic paper presented in Korea not on powerpoint but on bark cloth.

I sense freedom, grace and integration. Such are some of the benefits when we return to our story, when the personal is woven into the academic, when deep listening enables us to see and hear ourselves in new ways.

Thursday, February 18, 2016

Creative resource: Ira

Ira is a resource I picked up at Toitu Otago Settlers Musuem today. It is a set of small, handheld cards, about 2 cm by 6 cm. It is beautifully coloured on one side, with the same picture of a New Zealand landscape. On the other side, different for each card, is a Maori word and the English translation.

I thought it had potential as a creative spiritual resource. So I purchased it and brought it back to work.

Meeting my colleagues, I shuffled it, held it beautifully coloured side up and invited them to choose one. Each chose a card, turned it over, and read the word. Looking at them, it was obvious the word had personal significance, a helpful clarifying encouragement in the middle of a hot, tiring afternoon.

The word then became a benediction from me to them as they left at days end. “Enjoy being free.” “Go to be creative.”

I will use this as my Lenten discipline, choosing a word and prayerfully sitting with it.

It would also work well in group settings. You could turn one over and as an act of praise, invite the team to reflect on what that word looks like in the values of the team. Or share a story of how they have experienced that word. Or recall a Bible story that expresses the word.

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

Trinity worship, breath prayers and researching Lonergan

I led chapel today and had the sense that it worked brilliantly, offering a space that for many, provided a deep sense of connection with God. It connected with a range of senses, including seeing (contemplating the icon), touching (choosing a symbol of vocation), hearing (each others breathing), tasting (the communion elements). Let me explain.

After referencing Pentecost Sunday and inviting a call to worship, I introduced the icon, “Holy Theologian Bernard Lonergan in the Mystery of the Eternal Processions of the Most Blessed Trinity,” painted by Fr. William Hart McNichols.

I gave folk a few minutes in silence to consider it.

I then offered some explanation. I introduced a quote from Fred Crowe’s biography of Lonergan.

. . . in the welter of words that with other theologians it was his vocation to utter, Lonergan never lost [the insight] that theology can be done, must be done, that when it is done, we are confronted with mystery and bow our heads in adoration. Fred Crowe

I noted that I have been reading Bernard Lonergan as part of my missiology research in recent weeks. I described how research involves lots of reading and how as part of my research, I had discovered the icon. Which I have pinned to my desk. And how it then provided another dimension to my research, inviting prayer along with my reading.

I noted a few features of the icon. It references a painting by Lawren Harris, with Canadian landscape in the background. The light around the pine trees expresses a sense of God’s encounter with Lonergan’s vocation.

On the floor of the chapel I had placed books, pens, pads, name tag holders, white board markers, Bibles. I noted how in the icon, Lonergan was bent down in front of a book, a symbol of his vocation. I invited folk to pick up something from the floor that expressed their current vocation – as student, as lecturer, as administrator. Once collected, I invited folk to return to their seat and lay it down at their feet, much like Lonergan had. I then invited us, as Lonergan was, to look up, expectantly, attentively.

Suddenly each of us were engaging with the icon not just as something visual that we were looking at, but as something we were physically participating with. Our bodies were becoming more deeply connected.

I noted how in the icon, the Spirit spoke as Lonergan looked up. So what one word might the Spirit be wanting to speak to us, as we looked up from our vocations? Which meant that we all as a group had now moved into a time of lectio divina. We had move from sermon to prayer, from explanation to worship.

I maintained this space by introducing a series of breath prayers. We breathed in strength, freedom, hope and love; and breathed out exhaustion, self-doubt, distrust and hate. That sense of looking up, expectantly, attentively, was maintained through the in and out of our breathing. There was by now a palpable sense of God in the air as together, looking up from our individual and diverse vocations, we continued to connect with God.

A seque into communion then occurred, by inviting folk to place their symbol on the communion table. Our vocations were recentered by bread and wine. We continued to breath together as we encountered grace in the sacraments.

There were many people expressing thanks at the end, for the richness and depth, for the dignity given to the practice of theology, for the space to breathe in God. In just over 20 minutes, we had worshipped, prayed, participated in the sacraments, in a way that connected our ordinary and everyday vocations with Divine presence.

Wednesday, March 04, 2015

lectio decorio (reading the skin)

A creationary: a space to be creative with the lectionary. For more resources go here.

Lectio divina (divine reading) is a practice by which Scripture is read slowly, seeking for God’s voice. Today I invited the community at worship at Uniting College to enter into lectio decorio (reading the skin). (Decorio is latin for skin).

The spark was the lectionary text – John 2:13-22, when Jesus cleanses the temple. Searching google, I found the work of Amanda Galloway. As a way to connect with women in India, a system of Biblical story telling has been developed. It uses the traditional henna process to symbolize biblical stories (I’ve blogged about henna and Biblical storytelling before). Henna, a temporary artwork drawn on hands and other parts of the body, is a popular beauty technique in parts of Asia, Africa and the Middle East. As the story is told, the images are drawn onto the hand and arm.

I didn’t have the time (chapel is 20 minutes, including communion), nor the materials (henna), to literally use henna. But I loved the way the Amanda Galloway’s design told the story, and told it onto skin. It seeemed to also connect with the Biblical text, which was all about whips and overturned tables and thus a story about skin in the game of justice.

So, after reading the lectionary text, I introduced the design. I noted how it is used. I then invited folk to trace the design onto their skin. Not with henna, but by using their finger, while I read the text (slowly enough to give time for the tracing).

And so skin touched skin, as the Bible story was heard and traced (decorio).

I then repeated the process, inviting folk to trace to design on their other hand. Given that folk most likely initially chose their dominant hand, it felt deeply gospel to trace the design again, this time using a weaker finger. This also created links between the two contexts – us in the first week of the semester, with all the new learning that a semester involves, women in India, unable to read, but still opening themselves to learning.

I then moved into the six minute communion. And suddenly the passing of the peace had new meaning. It was another moment of lectio decorio, reading the skin, as the gospel story traced on my hand touched the gospel story traced on the hand on another.

I’m still to unpack with those gathered what the experience meant for them.

But for me, the invitation three times to hear a Gospel story, the deeper sense of connection as that gospel was traced on my skin, the sharing of a practice from another cultural context as an expression of solidarity in learning – felt very embodied.

Thursday, September 25, 2014

green theologies: ancient, creative

Water gives life. The shores of Lake Galilee are richly green, filled with fruit, treelined and in places covered with grass. On the lake shore at Tagba is the Church of Multiplication. It honours the feeding of the multitudes, the rich abundance of that miracle. What is intriguing is that on the church floor, on either side of the altar, are a set of mosiacs.

They are beautiful, and feature birds, lilies, flowers. Most are local, bird and plant life from local Galilee. The mosaics are from the 5th century and are the earliest known examples of figured pavement in Christian art in the Holy Land.

It’s an extraordinary expression of green theology. It connects the church indoors with the creation outdoors. It celebrates the local. It is a wonderful link with the miracle story, but contextualised in an honouring of the abundant gifts of land and lake.

And it’s 1500 years old. Green theology likes to position itself as modern, hip and new. The mosaic artists and the ordinary Christians of Tagba would shake their head in disbelief. Their church, their everyday worship, was ancient, ordinarily and creatively green.

Monday, May 05, 2014

how a voluntary society in a rural town made eHistory

I love stories of innovation. Here is one of a voluntary group in a small, rural town, who made eHistory. The full story is here, but to give you a taster, I’ve made a summary, using words from the entire article.

Carnamah is a town and farming community [of 500 people] 300 kilometres north of Perth. The Carnamah Historical Society was founded in 1983 to collect, record, preserve and promote local history. Made up of folk with a background in wheat and sheep farming, they have no ongoing funding and are volunteer run.

To share history and heritage they created online content, 600 pages. Then primary school educational resources. Then an online data base that utilised virtual volunteers to help with transcription and indexing tasks.

The result: thousands more people have discovered and now have a strong and personal connection; donations of heritage material; featured in National Museum of Australia exhibition; appeared in Inside History magazine twice.

The difference is simply that we’ve made a lot of history discoverable online. We want to share, not just possess. We, as a [history] sector have a terrible track record of doing what we’ve always done and not straying too far from the familiar path. It comes down to attitude. Will you learn or try what you don’t know?

The essential ingredients that tend to be lacking are not ideas, examples to follow, time, availability of funding or technical skill. They are very often attitude, ethos and organisational culture.

I think there are a lot of encouragements and challenges in this story for any group in our changing world.

Friday, March 07, 2014

Dispersed Lent Journal Project 2014

Four journals. On the front cover, the following words … Open me, browse me, take me, write in me, return me.

Inside, mainly blank white pages. A few images, a few practices, in case people get stuck. And the following explanation

Dispersed Lent Journal Project

Here at 34 Lipsett Terrace, we are a dispersed community. We are students, staff, teachers. We are post-graduates and undergraduates. We are studying for audit and for credit. We are casual library borrowers and we are hard working full-time students.

The Lenten journal project invites those who cross paths at 34 Lipsett Terrace to share with each other, through a dispersed pattern, what the season of Lent means to us.

The Overview: Lent in the church year is a time to focus on spiritual renewal. Different traditions in the church do this differently. The Dispersed Lent journals invite you to share with each other what this season means to you and how you connect more fully with the God-story in the days leading up to Easter.

The concept: A journal is a place to write. We can write privately, for ourselves. We can write publicly for others. The Lent journal invites us to write publicly, to share faith with each other.

How to proceed?
1. Once you have received the journal, you have no more than seven and no less than two days to spend with it.
2. During those days, put whatever you like in the journal – thoughts, ideas, drawings, photos, recipes, reflections – anything that captures what Lent means for you and how you connect with God during this season. Be creative. Use the exercises or images. Write in your own language.
3. Write aware that what you write will be read by a stranger. That is the nature of a public journal.
4. When you are finished, pass the journal onto another person in the Department of Flinders or ACD or UCLT or Adelaide Theological Library community.
a) It might be someone in your class
b) It might be a lecturer or staff person
c) You might leave it on the table in the Common Space or Adelaide Theological Library.
5. If you get given a journal for a second or third time, it will most likely be different than the first time you received it – different time, more input. You could pass it on straight away. Or treat it as an invitation to write further.

Who gets a journal? Four journals have been prepared. Each is different – different visual, different set of potential practices. Each will be touched by different hands, passed to different people. Each will encounter you at a different time in Lent. Each will be released into the 34 Lipsett Terrace community during the first week of Lent. After the initial release, who knows where the journals will go. Such is the mystery of God in the community.

How is it shared? The journals are public. If you see one, feel free to browse it. When finished, we might scan journal pages (including onto the website) and use them in ongoing ways around the 34 Lipsett Tce campus to encourage students and enhance worship.

So please be aware that by participating in this project, your work will be shared with others.

Friday, December 06, 2013

intuitive worship: baptism, ministry, deeper water and Psalm 42

Today we farewelled a colleague. They had expressed a desire for a ritual moment, so over a number of days, by email, among a number of folk, a service of leaving was sketched.

It’s been a hectic week at College and with one of the key folk sick, I wasn’t convinced that all the i’s were crossed or t’s were dotted. Just in case, I grabbed a Bible as I left my office – a useful tool in case of emergencies.

Sure enough, it emerged on the walk over that no-one was down to do the Bible reading. I’d suggested it, so was happy to read. Especially since I had a Bible.

It was the Psalm for today in the Lectionary, Psalm 42. It fitted really well with the opening song. The colleague loves Paul Kelly, so we’d chosen Deeper Water, a song about growth, journey, life.

Deeper water, deeper water,
Deeper water, calling them on

As the song played live, I began to wonder were to stand to read. My eyes settled on the baptismal font. Water. An intuitive link gets made in my mind.

So as the song ended, I stood and walked to the baptismal font. I introduced the Psalm as about deeper water, as about where is God in deeper water. (As a hart longs for flowing streams (v. 1); Deep calls to deep at the thunder of thy cataracts; all thy waves and thy billows have gone over me (v. 7).)

As the Psalm ended, I returned (Djed) the lyrics of the song. “Deeper water, calling you on, and you’re never alone.” I dipped my hands in the water of the baptismal font and walked across to our departing colleague and bent to make the sign of the cross on his forehead.

An intuitive moment – a mix of Paul Kelly, Psalm 42 and the Christian ritual of baptism. For it is in our baptism that we are called into ministry. So a re-affirmation of baptism as that which holds us on the ongoing journey into ministry.

A few extra seconds, wordless, in which the waters of baptism were applied. And I returned, in silence to my seat. It had felt, intuitively the right thing to do.

Creationary: a space to be creative with the lectionary (in this case, baptism, ministry and Psalm 42). For more resources go here.

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

I journal religiously twice

I journal religiously twice. Religiously because it is a paired set of spiritual practices, that keep me in grounded, reflective and in community.

I journal religiously once, publicly, on this blog. It is a place to collect what I’m reading and doing. It’s been a discipline for over 11 years now. I began because I wanted to connect beyond Sunday with my congregation and to explore this new way of being human that is a digital world. It helps me reflect on ministry. I regularly think about stopping but then a helpful comment opens up a new insight and I realise the gift that is communication in community.

I journal religiously a second time, my own handwritten journal. It’s been a discipline from when I began formally training for ministry. I never think about stopping, for handwriting grounds me, connects me. I need to save insights, to record my pain, to jot down the spiritual insight of a moment walking or reading.

Over time, I’ve introduced new practices. Every Saturday I try and collect the achievements of a work week in a few simple dot points. This is essential, for my current work is overwhelming and relentless and I need to remind myself of progress. Or I use Celtic knots to untangle the complexity of an issue. Sometimes these notes can be worked up for public consumption, an insight becomes a sermon, a section allows me to capture a moment.

I handwrite much more than I used to and it’s such a precious space. The increase in handwriting has been a fascinating byproduct of the job. I think it’s because I need to find myself in the rush of a 7 meeting day.

I began to reflect on journalling because one of my handwritten journals is coming to an end. I’m always sad. I’m losing a familar friend and I hate the starting of something new, those first fresh pages speak of no life lived. I often leave the first page blank. A space for God to be God. And a way of beginning, of saying I’ve simply started.

This finished journal will be filed, along with others. As I come to year’s end or to an annual performance review, I will pull out my journal and read through the year. I will begin to catch patterns I’d not seen before. It helps give shape to my becoming, to the work of God in the hard places of life.

I journal religiously twice, a paired set of spiritual practices. But what is really interesting is that I have written this here – digitally – not there – in the handwritten journal.